16 Common Problems and Their Solutions

16.1 Finding and Gathering Information

16.2 Installation Problems
16.3 Boot Problems
16.4 Login Problems
16.5 Network Problems
16.6 Data Problems
This chapter describes a range of potential problems and their solutions. Even if
your situation is not precisely listed here, there may be one similar enough to
offer hints to the solution of your problem.
16.1 Finding and Gathering Information  REPORT BUG #
Linux reports things in a very detailed way. There are several places to look when
you encounter problems with your system, most of which are standard to Linux
systems in general, and some are relevant to openSUSE Leap systems. Most log
files can be viewed with YaST (Miscellaneous › Start-Up Log).
YaST offers the possibility to collect all system information needed by the support
team. Use Other › Support and select the problem category. When all information is
gathered, attach it to your support request.
A list of the most frequently checked log files follows with the description of their
typical purpose. Paths containing ~ refer to the current user's home directory.
TABLE 16.1: LOG FILES REPORT BUG#
Log File Description
~/.xsession-errors Messages from the desktop applications currently running.

/var/log/apparmor/
Log files from AppArmor, see Book “Security Guide” for
detailed information.
Log file from Audit to track any access to files, directories,
/var/log/audit/audit.log or resources of your system, and trace system calls.
See Book “Security Guide” for detailed information.
/var/log/mail.* Messages from the mail system.

/var/log/NetworkManager
Log file from NetworkManager to collect problems with
network connectivity
/var/log/samba/ Directory containing Samba server and client log messages.

/var/log/warn
All messages from the kernel and system log daemon with
the “warning” level or higher.

/var/log/wtmp
Binary file containing user login records for the current
machine session. View it with last.

/var/log/Xorg.*.log
Various start-up and runtime log files from the X Window
System. It is useful for debugging failed X start-ups.
/var/log/YaST2/ Directory containing YaST's actions and their results.
/var/log/zypper.log Log file of Zypper.
Apart from log files, your machine also supplies you with information about the
running system. See Table 16.2: System Information With the /proc File System
TABLE 16.2: SYSTEM INFORMATION WITH THE /PROC FILE SYSTEM REPORT BUG#
File Description
/proc/cpuinfo Contains processor information, including its type, make, model, and
File Description
performance.
/proc/dma Shows which DMA channels are currently being used.

/proc/interrupts
Shows which interrupts are in use, and how many of each have been
in use.
/proc/iomem Displays the status of I/O (input/output) memory.
/proc/ioports Shows which I/O ports are in use at the moment.
/proc/meminfo Displays memory status.
/proc/modules Displays the individual modules.
/proc/mounts Displays devices currently mounted.
/proc/partitions Shows the partitioning of all hard disks.
/proc/version Displays the current version of Linux.
Apart from the /proc file system, the Linux kernel exports information with
the sysfs module, an in-memory file system. This module represents kernel
objects, their attributes and relationships. For more information about sysfs, see
the context of udev in Book “Reference”, Chapter 16 “Dynamic Kernel Device Management
with udev”. Table 16.3 contains an overview of the most common directories
under /sys.
TABLE 16.3: SYSTEM INFORMATION WITH THE /SYS FILE SYSTEM REPORT BUG#
File Description

/sys/block
Contains subdirectories for each block device discovered in the system.
Generally, these are mostly disk type devices.
/sys/bus Contains subdirectories for each physical bus type.

/sys/class
Contains subdirectories grouped together as a functional types of devices
(like graphics, net, printer, etc.)
/sys/device Contains the global device hierarchy.
Linux comes with several tools for system analysis and monitoring. See Book
“System Analysis and Tuning Guide”, Chapter 2 “System Monitoring Utilities” for a selection of
the most important ones used in system diagnostics.
Each of the following scenarios begins with a header describing the problem
followed by a paragraph or two offering suggested solutions, available references
for more detailed solutions, and cross-references to other scenarios that are
related.
16.2 Installation Problems  REPORT BUG #
Installation problems are situations when a machine fails to install. It may fail
entirely or it may not be able to start the graphical installer. This section
highlights some typical problems you may run into, and offers possible solutions
or workarounds for these kinds of situations.
16.2.1 Checking Media REPORT BUG#
If you encounter any problems using the openSUSE Leap installation media,
check the integrity of your installation media. Boot from the media and
choose Check Installation Media from the boot menu. In a running system, start YaST
and choose Software › Media Check. To check the openSUSE Leap medium, insert it
into the drive and click Start Check in the Media Check screen of YaST. This may take
several minutes. If errors are detected, do not use this medium for installation.
Media problems may occur when having burned the medium yourself. Burning the
media at a low speed (4x) helps to avoid problems.

FIGURE 16.1: CHECKING MEDIA REPORT BUG#

16.2.2 No Bootable DVD Drive Available REPORT BUG#
If your computer does not contain a bootable DVD-ROM drive or if the one you
have is not supported by Linux, there are several options you can install your
machine without a built-in DVD drive:
Using an External Boot Device
If it is supported by your BIOS and the installation kernel, boot from
external DVD drives or USB storage devices. Refer to Section 2.2.1, “PC
(AMD64/Intel 64/ARM AArch64): System Start-up” for instructions on how
to create a bootable USB storage device.
Network Boot via PXE
If a machine lacks a DVD drive, but provides a working Ethernet
connection, perform a completely network-based installation.
16.2.2.1 External Boot Devices REPORT BUG#
Linux supports most existing DVD drives. If the system has no DVD drive, it is
still possible that an external DVD drive, connected through USB, FireWire, or
 SCSI, can be used to boot the system. This depends mainly on the interaction of
the BIOS and the hardware used. Sometimes a BIOS update may help if you
encounter problems.
When installing from a Live CD, you can also create a “Live flash disk” to boot
from.
16.2.3 Booting from Installation Media Fails REPORT BUG#
One reason a machine does not boot the installation media can be an incorrect
boot sequence setting in BIOS. The BIOS boot sequence must have DVD drive set
as the first entry for booting. Otherwise the machine would try to boot from
another medium, typically the hard disk. Guidance for changing the BIOS boot
sequence can be found the documentation provided with your mainboard, or in
the following paragraphs.
The BIOS is the software that enables the very basic functions of a computer.
Motherboard vendors provide a BIOS specifically made for their hardware.
Normally, the BIOS setup can only be accessed at a specific time—when the
machine is booting. During this initialization phase, the machine performs several
diagnostic hardware tests. One of them is a memory check, indicated by a
memory counter. When the counter appears, look for a line, usually below the
counter or somewhere at the bottom, mentioning the key to press to access the
BIOS setup. Usually the key to press is one of  Del ,  F1 , or  Esc . Press this key until
the BIOS setup screen appears.
PROCEDURE 16.1: CHANGING THE BIOS BOOT SEQUENCE REPORT BUG#
1. Enter the BIOS using the proper key as announced by the boot routines and wait for the
BIOS screen to appear.
2. To change the boot sequence in an AWARD BIOS, look for the BIOS FEATURES
SETUP entry. Other manufacturers may have a different name for this, such as ADVANCED CMOS
SETUP. When you have found the entry, select it and confirm with  Enter .
3. In the screen that opens, look for a subentry called BOOT SEQUENCE or BOOT ORDER.
Change the settings by pressing  Page ↑  or  Page ↓  until the DVD drive is listed first.
4. Leave the BIOS setup screen by pressing  Esc . To save the changes, select SAVE & EXIT
SETUP, or press  F10 . To confirm that your settings should be saved, press  Y .
PROCEDURE 16.2: CHANGING THE BOOT SEQUENCE IN AN SCSI BIOS (ADAPTEC HOST
ADAPTER) REPORT BUG#
1. Open the setup by pressing  Ctrl – A .
2. Select Disk Utilities. The connected hardware components are now displayed.
Make note of the SCSI ID of your DVD drive.
3. Exit the menu with  Esc .
4. Open Configure Adapter Settings. Under Additional Options, select Boot Device Options and
press  Enter .
5. Enter the ID of the DVD drive and press  Enter  again.
6. Press  Esc  twice to return to the start screen of the SCSI BIOS.
7. Exit this screen and confirm with Yes to boot the computer.
Regardless of what language and keyboard layout your final installation will be
using, most BIOS configurations use the US keyboard layout as depicted in the
following figure:
 FIGURE 16.2: US KEYBOARD LAYOUT REPORT BUG#
16.2.4 Fails to Boot REPORT BUG#
Some hardware types, mainly very old or very recent ones, fail to install. Often
this may happen because support for this type of hardware is missing in the
installation kernel, or because of certain functionality included in this kernel, such
as ACPI, that can still cause problems on some hardware.
If your system fails to install using the standard Installation mode from the first
installation boot screen, try the following:
1. With the DVD still in the drive, reboot the machine with  Ctrl – Alt – Del  or using the
hardware reset button.
2. When the boot screen appears, press  F5 , use the arrow keys of your keyboard to navigate
to No ACPI and press  Enter  to launch the boot and installation process. This option disables the
support for ACPI power management techniques.
3. Proceed with the installation as described in Chapter 2, Installation with YaST.
If this fails, proceed as above, but choose Safe Settings instead. This option disables
ACPI and DMA support. Most hardware will boot with this option.
If both of these options fail, use the boot options prompt to pass any additional
parameters needed to support this type of hardware to the installation kernel. For
more information about the parameters available as boot options, refer to the
kernel documentation located in /usr/src/linux/Documentation/kernel-
parameters.txt.

Tip: Obtaining Kernel Documentation

Install the kernel-source package to view the kernel documentation.
There are various other ACPI-related kernel parameters that can be entered at
the boot prompt prior to booting for installation:
acpi=off
This parameter disables the complete ACPI subsystem on your computer.
This may be useful if your computer cannot handle ACPI or if you think
ACPI in your computer causes trouble.
acpi=force
 Always enable ACPI even if your computer has an old BIOS dated before
the year 2000. This parameter also enables ACPI if it is set in addition
to acpi=off.
acpi=noirq
Do not use ACPI for IRQ routing.
acpi=ht
Run only enough ACPI to enable hyper-threading.
acpi=strict
Be less tolerant of platforms that are not strictly ACPI specification
compliant.
pci=noacpi
Disable PCI IRQ routing of the new ACPI system.
pnpacpi=off
This option is for serial or parallel problems when your BIOS setup
contains wrong interrupts or ports.
notsc
Disable the time stamp counter. This option can be used to work around
timing problems on your systems. It is a recent feature, if you see
regressions on your machine, especially time related or even total hangs,
this option is worth a try.
nohz=off
Disable the nohz feature. If your machine hangs, this option may help.
Otherwise it is of no use.
Once you have determined the right parameter combination, YaST automatically
writes them to the boot loader configuration to make sure that the system boots
properly next time.
If unexplainable errors occur when the kernel is loaded or during the installation,
select Memory Test in the boot menu to check the memory. If Memory Test returns an
error, it is usually a hardware error.
16.2.5 Fails to Launch Graphical Installer REPORT BUG#
After you insert the medium into your drive and reboot your machine, the
installation screen comes up, but after you select Installation, the graphical installer
does not start.
There are several ways to deal with this situation:
 Try to select another screen resolution for the installation dialogs.
 Select Text Mode for installation.
 Do a remote installation via VNC using the graphical installer.
PROCEDURE 16.3: CHANGE SCREEN RESOLUTION FOR INSTALLATION REPORT BUG#
1. Boot for installation.
2. Press  F3  to open a menu from which to select a lower resolution for installation purposes.
3. Select Installation and proceed with the installation as described in Chapter 2, Installation
with YaST.
PROCEDURE 16.4: INSTALLATION IN TEXT MODE REPORT BUG#
1. Boot for installation.
2. Press  F3  and select Text Mode.
3. Select Installation and proceed with the installation as described in Chapter 2, Installation
with YaST.
PROCEDURE 16.5: VNC INSTALLATION REPORT BUG#
1. Boot for installation.
2. Enter the following text at the boot options prompt:
vnc=1 vncpassword=some_password
Replace some_password with the password to use for VNC installation.
3. Select Installation then press  Enter  to start the installation.
 Instead of starting right into the graphical installation routine, the system continues to run in a text
mode, then halts, displaying a message containing the IP address and port number at which the
installer can be reached via a browser interface or a VNC viewer application.
4. If using a browser to access the installer, launch the browser and enter the address
information provided by the installation routines on the future openSUSE Leap machine and
press  Enter :
http://ip_address_of_machine:5801
A dialog opens in the browser window prompting you for the VNC password. Enter it and proceed
with the installation as described in Chapter 2, Installation with YaST.

Important: Cross-platform Support

Installation via VNC works with any browser under any operating system, provided Java support is
enabled.

Provide the IP address and password to your VNC viewer when prompted. A window opens,
displaying the installation dialogs. Proceed with the installation as usual.
16.2.6 Only Minimalistic Boot Screen Started REPORT BUG#
You inserted the medium into the drive, the BIOS routines are finished, but the
system does not start with the graphical boot screen. Instead it launches a very
minimalistic text-based interface. This may happen on any machine not providing
sufficient graphics memory for rendering a graphical boot screen.
Although the text boot screen looks minimalistic, it provides nearly the same
functionality as the graphical one:
Boot Options
Unlike the graphical interface, the different boot options cannot be
selected using the cursor keys of your keyboard. The boot menu of the
text mode boot screen offers some keywords to enter at the boot prompt.
These keywords map to the options offered in the graphical version. Enter
your choice and press  Enter  to launch the boot process.
Custom Boot Options
After selecting a boot option, enter the appropriate keyword at the boot
prompt or enter some custom boot options as described in Section 16.2.4,
“Fails to Boot”. To launch the installation process, press  Enter .
Screen Resolutions
Use the F keys to determine the screen resolution for installation. If you
need to boot in text mode, choose  F3 .

16.3 Boot Problems  REPORT BUG #

Boot problems are situations when your system does not boot properly (does not
boot to the expected target and login screen).
16.3.1 The GRUB 2 Boot Loader Fails to Load REPORT BUG#
If the hardware is functioning properly, it is possible that the boot loader is
corrupted and Linux cannot start on the machine. In this case, it is necessary to
repair the boot loader. To do so, you need to start the Rescue System as
described in Section 16.6.2, “Using the Rescue System” and follow the
instructions in Section 16.6.2.4, “Modifying and Re-installing the Boot Loader”.
Alternatively, you can use the Rescue System to fix the boot loader as follows.
Boot your machine from the installation media. In the boot screen,
choose More › Boot Linux System. Select the disk containinig the installed system and
kernel with the default kernel options.
FIGURE 16.3: SELECT DISK REPORT BUG#
When the system is booted, start YaST and switch to System › Boot Loader. Make
sure that the Write generic Boot Code to MRB option is enabled, and press OK. This
fixes the corrupted boot loader by overwriting it, or installs the boot loader if it's
missing.
Other reasons for the machine not booting may be BIOS-related:
BIOS Settings
 Check your BIOS for references to your hard disk. GRUB 2 may simply not
be started if the hard disk itself cannot be found with the current BIOS
settings.
BIOS Boot Order
Check whether your system's boot order includes the hard disk. If the
hard disk option was not enabled, your system may install properly, but
fails to boot when access to the hard disk is required.
16.3.2 No Login or Prompt Appears REPORT BUG#
This behavior typically occurs after a failed kernel upgrade and it is known as
a kernel panic because of the type of error on the system console that sometimes
can be seen at the final stage of the process. If, in fact, the machine has just
been rebooted following a software update, the immediate goal is to reboot it
using the old, proven version of the Linux kernel and associated files. This can be
done in the GRUB 2 boot loader screen during the boot process as follows:
1. Reboot the computer using the reset button, or switch it off and on again.
2. When the GRUB 2 boot screen becomes visible, select the Advanced Options entry and
choose the previous kernel from the menu. The machine will boot using the prior version of the
kernel and its associated files.
3. After the boot process has completed, remove the newly installed kernel and, if necessary,
set the default boot entry to the old kernel using the YaST Boot Loader module. For more
information refer to Book “Reference”, Chapter 12 “The Boot Loader GRUB 2”, Section 12.3
“Configuring the Boot Loader with YaST”. However, doing this is probably not necessary because
automated update tools normally modify it for you during the rollback process.
4. Reboot.
If this does not fix the problem, boot the computer using the installation media.
After the machine has booted, continue with Step 3.
16.3.3 No Graphical Login REPORT BUG#
If the machine comes up, but does not boot into the graphical login manager,
anticipate problems either with the choice of the default systemd target or the
configuration of the X Window System. To check the current systemd default
target run the command sudo systemctl get-default. If the value returned
is not graphical.target, run the command sudo systemctl isolate
graphical.target. If the graphical login screen starts, log in and
start YaST › System › Services Manager and set the Default System Target to Graphical
Interface. From now on the system should boot into the graphical login screen.
If the graphical login screen does not start even if having booted or switched to
the graphical target, your desktop or X Window software is probably
misconfigured or corrupted. Examine the log files at /var/log/Xorg.*.log for
detailed messages from the X server as it attempted to start. If the desktop fails
during start, it may log error messages to the system journal that can be queried
with the command journalctl (see Book “Reference”, Chapter 11 “journalctl: Query
the systemd Journal” for more information). If these error messages hint at a
configuration problem in the X server, try to fix these issues. If the graphical
system still does not come up, consider reinstalling the graphical desktop.
16.3.4 Root Btrfs Partition Cannot Be Mounted REPORT BUG#
If a btrfs root partition becomes corrupted, try the following options:
 Mount the partition with the -o recovery option.
 If that fails, run btrfs-zero-log on your root partition.
16.3.5 Force Checking Root Partitions REPORT BUG#
If the root partition becomes corrupted, use the parameter forcefsck on the boot
prompt. This passes the option -f (force) to the fsck command.
 16.4  Login Problems  REPORT BUG #
Login problems are those where your machine does, in fact, boot to the expected
welcome screen or login prompt, but refuses to accept the user name and
password, or accepts them but then does not behave properly (fails to start the
graphic desktop, produces errors, drops to a command line, etc.).
16.4.1 Valid User Name and Password Combinations Fail REPORT BUG#
This usually occurs when the system is configured to use network authentication
or directory services and, for some reason, cannot retrieve results from its
configured servers. The root user, as the only local user, is the only user that can
still log in to these machines. The following are some common reasons a machine
appears functional but cannot process logins correctly:
The network is not working. For further directions on this, turn to Section 16.5, “Network Problems”.
DNS is not working at the moment (which prevents GNOME from working and the system from making
validated requests to secure servers). One indication that this is the case is that the machine takes an
extremely long time to respond to any action. Find more information about this topic
in Section 16.5, “Network Problems”.
 If the system is configured to use Kerberos, the system's local time may have drifted past the
accepted variance with the Kerberos server time (this is typically 300 seconds). If NTP (network
time protocol) is not working properly or local NTP servers are not working, Kerberos
authentication ceases to function because it depends on common clock synchronization across the
network.
 The system's authentication configuration is misconfigured. Check the PAM configuration
files involved for any typographical errors or misordering of directives. For additional background
information about PAM and the syntax of the configuration files involved, refer to Book “Security
Guide”, Chapter 2 “Authentication with PAM”.
The home partition is encrypted. Find more information about this topic in Section 16.4.3, “Login to
Encrypted Home Partition Fails”.
In all cases that do not involve external network problems, the solution is to
reboot the system into single-user mode and repair the configuration before
booting again into operating mode and attempting to log in again. To boot into
single-user mode:
 Reboot the system. The boot screen appears, offering a prompt.
 Press  Esc  to exit the splash screen and get to the GRUB 2 text-based menu.
 Press  B  to enter the GRUB 2 editor.
 Add the following parameter to the line containing the Kernel parameters:
systemd.unit=rescue.target
 Press  F10 .
 Enter the user name and password for root.
 Make all the necessary changes.
 Boot into the full multiuser and network mode by entering systemctl isolate
graphical.target at the command line.
16.4.2 Valid User Name and Password Not Accepted REPORT BUG#
This is by far the most common problem users encounter, because there are
many reasons this can occur. Depending on whether you use local user
management and authentication or network authentication, login failures occur
for different reasons.
Local user management can fail for the following reasons:
 The user may have entered the wrong password.
 The user's home directory containing the desktop configuration files is corrupted or write
protected.
 There may be problems with the X Window System authenticating this particular user,
especially if the user's home directory has been used with another Linux distribution prior to
installing the current one.
To locate the reason for a local login failure, proceed as follows:
 Check whether the user remembered his password correctly before you start debugging the
whole authentication mechanism. If the user may not remember his password correctly, use the
YaST User Management module to change the user's password. Pay attention to the  Caps Lock  key
and unlock it, if necessary.
 Log in as root and check the system journal with journalctl -e for error messages of the
login process and of PAM.
Try to log in from a console (using  Ctrl – Alt – F1 ). If this is successful, the blame cannot be put on PAM,
because it is possible to authenticate this user on this machine. Try to locate any problems with the
X Window System or the GNOME desktop. For more information, refer to Section 16.4.4, “Login
Successful but GNOME Desktop Fails”.
 If the user's home directory has been used with another Linux distribution, remove
the Xauthority file in the user's home. Use a console login via  Ctrl – Alt – F1  and run rm
.Xauthority as this user. This should eliminate X authentication problems for this user. Try
graphical login again.
If the desktop could not start because of corrupt configuration files, proceed with Section 16.4.4, “Login
Successful but GNOME Desktop Fails”.
In the following, common reasons a network authentication for a particular user
may fail on a specific machine are listed:
 The user may have entered the wrong password.
 The user name exists in the machine's local authentication files and is also provided by a
network authentication system, causing conflicts.
 The home directory exists but is corrupt or unavailable. Perhaps it is write protected or is on
a server that is inaccessible at the moment.
 The user does not have permission to log in to that particular host in the authentication
system.
 The machine has changed host names, for whatever reason, and the user does not have
permission to log in to that host.
 The machine cannot reach the authentication server or directory server that contains that
user's information.
 There may be problems with the X Window System authenticating this particular user,
especially if the user's home has been used with another Linux distribution prior to installing the
current one.
To locate the cause of the login failures with network authentication, proceed as
follows:
 Check whether the user remembered their password correctly before you start debugging the
whole authentication mechanism.
 Determine the directory server which the machine relies on for authentication and make sure
that it is up and running and properly communicating with the other machines.
 Determine that the user's user name and password work on other machines to make sure that
his authentication data exists and is properly distributed.
 See if another user can log in to the misbehaving machine. If another user can log in without
difficulty or if root can log in, log in and examine the system journal with journalctl -e> file.
Locate the time stamps that correspond to the login attempts and determine if PAM has produced
any error messages.
Try to log in from a console (using  Ctrl – Alt – F1 ). If this is successful, the problem is not with PAM or
the directory server on which the user's home is hosted, because it is possible to authenticate this
user on this machine. Try to locate any problems with the X Window System or the GNOME
 desktop. For more information, refer to Section 16.4.4, “Login Successful but GNOME Desktop
Fails”.
 If the user's home directory has been used with another Linux distribution, remove
the Xauthority file in the user's home. Use a console login via  Ctrl – Alt – F1  and run rm
.Xauthority as this user. This should eliminate X authentication problems for this user. Try
graphical login again.
If the desktop could not start because of corrupt configuration files, proceed with Section 16.4.4, “Login
Successful but GNOME Desktop Fails”.
16.4.3 Login to Encrypted Home Partition Fails REPORT BUG#
It is recommended to use an encrypted home partition for laptops. If you cannot
log in to your laptop, the reason is usually simple: your partition could not be
unlocked.
During the boot time, you need to enter the passphrase to unlock your encrypted
partition. If you do not enter it, the boot process continues, leaving the partition
locked.
To unlock your encrypted partition, proceed as follows:
 Switch to the text console with  Ctrl – Alt – F1 .
 Become root.
 Restart the unlocking process again with:
systemctl restart home.mount

 Enter your passphrase to unlock your encrypted partition.

 Exit the text console and switch back to the login screen with  Alt – F7 .
 Log in as usual.
16.4.4 Login Successful but GNOME Desktop Fails REPORT BUG#
If this is the case, it is likely that your GNOME configuration files have become
corrupted. Some symptoms may include the keyboard failing to work, the screen
geometry becoming distorted, or even the screen coming up as a bare gray field.
The important distinction is that if another user logs in, the machine works
normally. It is then likely that the problem can be fixed relatively quickly by
simply moving the user's GNOME configuration directory to a new location, which
causes GNOME to initialize a new one. Although the user is forced to reconfigure
GNOME, no data is lost.
 Switch to a text console by pressing  Ctrl – Alt – F1 .
 Log in with your user name.
 Move the user's GNOME configuration directories to a temporary location:
 mv .gconf .gconf-ORIG-RECOVER
mv .gnome2 .gnome2-ORIG-RECOVER

 Log out.
 Log in again, but do not run any applications.
 Recover your individual application configuration data (including the Evolution e-mail client
data) by copying the ~/.gconf-ORIG-RECOVER/apps/ directory back into the
new ~/.gconf directory as follows:
cp -a .gconf-ORIG-RECOVER/apps .gconf/

If this causes the login problems, attempt to recover only the critical application data and
reconfigure the remainder of the applications.
16.5  Network Problems  REPORT BUG #
Many problems of your system may be network-related, even though they do not
seem to be at first. For example, the reason for a system not allowing users to
log in may be a network problem of some kind. This section introduces a simple
 checklist you can apply to identify the cause of any network problem
encountered.
PROCEDURE 16.6: HOW TO IDENTIFY NETWORK PROBLEMS REPORT BUG#
When checking the network connection of your machine, proceed as follows:
 If you use an Ethernet connection, check the hardware first. Make sure that your network
cable is properly plugged into your computer and router (or hub, etc.). The control lights next to
your Ethernet connector are normally both be active.
If the connection fails, check whether your network cable works with another machine. If it does,
your network card causes the failure. If hubs or switches are included in your network setup, they
may be faulty, as well.
 If using a wireless connection, check whether the wireless link can be established by other
machines. If not, contact the wireless network's administrator.
 Once you have checked your basic network connectivity, try to find out which service is not
responding. Gather the address information of all network servers needed in your setup. Either look
them up in the appropriate YaST module or ask your system administrator. The following list gives
some typical network servers involved in a setup together with the symptoms of an outage.
DNS (Name Service)
A broken or malfunctioning name service affects the network's functionality in many ways.
If the local machine relies on any network servers for authentication and these servers cannot
be found because of name resolution issues, users would not even be able to log in.
Machines in the network managed by a broken name server would not be able to “see” each
other and communicate.
NTP (Time Service)
A malfunctioning or completely broken NTP service could affect Kerberos authentication
and X server functionality.
NFS (File Service)
If any application needs data stored in an NFS mounted directory, it cannot start or function
properly if this service was down or misconfigured. In the worst case scenario, a user's
personal desktop configuration would not come up if their home directory containing
the .gconf subdirectory could not be found because of a faulty NFS server.
Samba (File Service)
If any application needs data stored in a directory on a faulty Samba server, it cannot start or
function properly.
NIS (User Management)
If your openSUSE Leap system relies on a faulty NIS server to provide the user data, users
cannot log in to this machine.
LDAP (User Management)
If your openSUSE Leap system relies on a faulty LDAP server to provide the user data,
users cannot log in to this machine.
Kerberos (Authentication)
Authentication will not work and login to any machine fails.
CUPS (Network Printing)
Users cannot print.
 Check whether the network servers are running and whether your network setup allows you
to establish a connection:

Important: Limitations
The debugging procedure described below only applies to a simple network server/client setup that
does not involve any internal routing. It assumes both server and client are members of the same
subnet without the need for additional routing.
o Use ping IP address or host name (replace host name with the host
name of the server) to check whether each one of them is up and responding to the network. If this
command is successful, it tells you that the host you were looking for is up and running and that
the name service for your network is configured correctly.
 If ping fails with destination host unreachable, either your system or the desired server is not
properly configured or down. Check whether your system is reachable by running ping IP
address or your_host_name from another machine. If you can reach your machine from
another machine, it is the server that is not running or not configured correctly.
If ping fails with unknown host, the name service is not configured correctly or the host name
used was incorrect. For further checks on this matter, refer to Step 4.b. If ping still fails, either
your network card is not configured correctly or your network hardware is faulty.
o Use host host name to check whether the host name of the server you are trying
to connect to is properly translated into an IP address and vice versa. If this command returns the
IP address of this host, the name service is up and running. If the host command fails, check all
network configuration files relating to name and address resolution on your host:
/etc/resolv.conf
This file is used to keep track of the name server and domain you are currently using. It can
be modified manually or automatically adjusted by YaST or DHCP. Automatic adjustment is
preferable. However, make sure that this file has the following structure and all network
addresses and domain names are correct:
search fully_qualified_domain_name
nameserver ipaddress_of_nameserver
This file can contain more than one name server address, but at least one of them must be
correct to provide name resolution to your host. If needed, adjust this file using the YaST
Network Setting module (Hostname/DNS tab).
If your network connection is handled via DHCP, enable DHCP to change host name and
name service information by selecting Change Hostname via DHCP and Update Name
Servers and Search List via DHCP in the YaST DNS and Hostname module.
/etc/nsswitch.conf
This file tells Linux where to look for name service information. It should look like this:
...
hosts: files dns
networks: files dns
...
The dns entry is vital. It tells Linux to use an external name server. Normally, these entries
are automatically managed by YaST, but it would be prudent to check.
If all the relevant entries on the host are correct, let your system administrator check the
DNS server configuration for the correct zone information. For detailed information about
DNS, refer to Book “Reference”, Chapter 19 “The Domain Name System”. If you have
made sure that the DNS configuration of your host and the DNS server are correct, proceed
with checking the configuration of your network and network device.
o If your system cannot establish a connection to a network server and you have
excluded name service problems from the list of possible culprits, check the configuration of your
network card.
Use the command ip addr show network_device to check whether this device was
properly configured. Make sure that the inet address with the netmask (/mask) is configured
correctly. An error in the IP address or a missing bit in your network mask would render your
network configuration unusable. If necessary, perform this check on the server as well.
o If the name service and network hardware are properly configured and running, but
some external network connections still get long time-outs or fail entirely,
use traceroute fully_qualified_domain_name (executed as root) to track the network
route these requests are taking. This command lists any gateway (hop) that a request from your
machine passes on its way to its destination. It lists the response time of each hop and whether this
hop is reachable. Use a combination of traceroute and ping to track down the culprit and let the
administrators know.
Once you have identified the cause of your network trouble, you can resolve it
yourself (if the problem is located on your machine) or let the system
administrators of your network know about your findings so they can reconfigure
the services or repair the necessary systems.
16.5.1 NetworkManager Problems REPORT BUG#
 If you have a problem with network connectivity, narrow it down as described
in Procedure 16.6, “How to Identify Network Problems”. If NetworkManager
seems to be the culprit, proceed as follows to get logs providing hints on why
NetworkManager fails:
 Open a shell and log in as root.
 Restart the NetworkManager:
systemctl restart Network.Manager
Open a Web page, for example, http://www.opensuse.org as normal user to see, if you can connect.
 Collect any information about the state of NetworkManager
in /var/log/NetworkManager.
For more information about NetworkManager, refer to Book “Reference”, Chapter 28
“Using NetworkManager”.
16.6  Data Problems  REPORT BUG #
Data problems are when the machine may or may not boot properly but, in either
case, it is clear that there is data corruption on the system and that the system
needs to be recovered. These situations call for a backup of your critical data,
enabling you to recover the system state from before your system
failed. openSUSE Leap offers dedicated YaST modules for system backup and
restoration and a rescue system that can be used to recover a corrupted system
from the outside.
16.6.1 Managing Partition Images REPORT BUG#
Sometimes you need to perform a backup from an entire partition or even hard
disk. Linux comes with the dd tool which can create an exact copy of your disk.
Combined with gzip you save some space.
PROCEDURE 16.7: BACKING UP AND RESTORING HARD DISKS REPORT BUG#
 Start a Shell as user root.
 Select your source device. Typically this is something like /dev/sda (labeled as SOURCE).
 Decide where you want to store your image (labeled as BACKUP_PATH). It must be
different from your source device. In other words: if you make a backup from /dev/sda, your
image file must not to be stored under /dev/sda.
 Run the commands to create a compressed image file:
dd if=/dev/SOURCE | gzip > /BACKUP_PATH/image.gz

 Restore the hard disk with the following commands:

gzip -dc /BACKUP_PATH/image.gz | dd of=/dev/SOURCE
If you only need to back up a partition, replace the SOURCE placeholder with your
respective partition. In this case, your image file can lie on the same hard disk,
but on a different partition.
16.6.2 Using the Rescue System REPORT BUG#
There are several reasons a system could fail to come up and run properly. A
corrupted file system following a system crash, corrupted configuration files, or a
corrupted boot loader configuration are the most common ones.
To help you to resolve these situations, openSUSE Leap contains a rescue system
that you can boot. The rescue system is a small Linux system that can be loaded
into a RAM disk and mounted as root file system, allowing you to access your
Linux partitions from the outside. Using the rescue system, you can recover or
modify any important aspect of your system.
 Manipulate any type of configuration file.
 Check the file system for defects and start automatic repair processes.
 Access the installed system in a “change root” environment.
 Check, modify, and re-install the boot loader configuration.
 Recover from a badly installed device driver or unusable kernel.
Resize partitions using the parted command. Find more information about this tool at the GNU Parted
Web site http://www.gnu.org/software/parted/parted.html.
The rescue system can be loaded from various sources and locations. The
simplest option is to boot the rescue system from the original installation
medium.
 Insert the installation medium into your DVD drive.
 Reboot the system.
 At the boot screen, press  F4  and choose DVD-ROM. Then choose Rescue System from the
main menu.
 Enter root at the Rescue: prompt. A password is not required.
If your hardware setup does not include a DVD drive, you can boot the rescue system from a
network source. The following example applies to a remote boot scenario—if using another boot
medium, such as a DVD, modify the info file accordingly and boot as you would for a normal
installation.
5. Enter the configuration of your PXE boot setup and add the
lines install=protocol://instsource and rescue=1. If you need to start the repair system,
use repair=1 instead. As with a normal installation, protocol stands for any of the supported
network protocols (NFS, HTTP, FTP, etc.) and instsource for the path to your network
installation source.
6. Boot the system using “Wake on LAN”.
7. Enter root at the Rescue: prompt. A password is not required.
Once you have entered the rescue system, you can use the virtual consoles that
can be reached with  Alt – F1  to  Alt – F6 .
A shell and many other useful utilities, such as the mount program, are available
in the /bin directory. The /sbin directory contains important file and network
utilities for reviewing and repairing the file system. This directory also contains
the most important binaries for system maintenance, such
as fdisk, mkfs, mkswap, mount, and shutdown, ip and ss for maintaining the
network. The directory /usr/bin contains the vi editor, find, less, and SSH.
To see the system messages, either use the command dmesg or view the system
log with journalctl.
16.6.2.1 Checking and Manipulating Configuration Files REPORT BUG#
As an example for a configuration that might be fixed using the rescue system,
imagine you have a broken configuration file that prevents the system from
booting properly. You can fix this using the rescue system.
To manipulate a configuration file, proceed as follows:
8. Start the rescue system using one of the methods described above.
9. To mount a root file system located under /dev/sda6 to the rescue system, use the
following command:
mount /dev/sda6 /mnt
All directories of the system are now located under /mnt
10. Change the directory to the mounted root file system:
cd /mnt

11. Open the problematic configuration file in the vi editor. Adjust and save the configuration.
12. Unmount the root file system from the rescue system:
umount /mnt

13. Reboot the machine.

16.6.2.2 Repairing and Checking File Systems REPORT BUG#
Generally, file systems cannot be repaired on a running system. If you encounter
serious problems, you may not even be able to mount your root file system and
the system boot may end with a “kernel panic”. In this case, the only way is to
 repair the system from the outside. The system contains the utilities to check and
repair the btrfs, ext2, ext3, ext4, reiserfs, xfs, dosfs, and vfat file systems. Look for
the command fsck. FILESYSTEM, for example, if you need a file system check
for btrfs, use fsck.btrfs.
16.6.2.3 Accessing the Installed System REPORT BUG#
If you need to access the installed system from the rescue system, you need to
do this in a change root environment. For example, to modify the boot loader
configuration, or to execute a hardware configuration utility.
To set up a change root environment based on the installed system, proceed as
follows:
4. Run lsblk to check which node corresponds to the root partition. It is /dev/sda2 in our
example:
5. lsblk
6. NAME MAJ:MIN RM SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
7. sda 8:0 0 149,1G 0 disk
8. ├─sda1 8:1 0 2G 0 part [SWAP]
9. ├─sda2 8:2 0 20G 0 part /
10. └─sda3 8:3 0 127G 0 part
└─cr_home 254:0 0 127G 0 crypt /home

11. Mount the root partition from the installed system:

mount /dev/sda2 /mnt
12. Mount /proc, /dev, and /sys partitions:
13. mount -t proc none /mnt/proc
14. mount --rbind /dev /mnt/dev
mount --rbind /sys /mnt/sys
15. Now you can “change root” into the new environment, keeping the bash shell:
chroot /mnt /bin/bash

16. Finally, mount the remaining partitions from the installed system:
mount -a
17. Now you have access to the installed system. Before rebooting the system, unmount the
partitions with umount -a and leave the “change root” environment with exit.

Warning: Limitations
Although you have full access to the files and applications of the installed system,
there are some limitations. The kernel that is running is the one that was booted
with the rescue system, not with the change root environment. It only supports
essential hardware and it is not possible to add kernel modules from the installed
system unless the kernel versions are identical. Always check the version of the
currently running (rescue) kernel with uname -r and then find out if a matching
subdirectory exists in the /lib/modules directory in the change root environment.
If yes, you can use the installed modules, otherwise you need to supply their
correct versions on other media, such as a flash disk. Most often the rescue
kernel version differs from the installed one — then you cannot simply access a
sound card, for example. It is also not possible to start a graphical user interface.
Also note that you leave the “change root” environment when you switch the
console with  Alt – F1  to  Alt – F6 .
16.6.2.4 Modifying and Re-installing the Boot Loader REPORT BUG#
Sometimes a system cannot boot because the boot loader configuration is
corrupted. The start-up routines cannot, for example, translate physical drives to
the actual locations in the Linux file system without a working boot loader.
To check the boot loader configuration and re-install the boot loader, proceed as
follows:
Perform the necessary steps to access the installed system as described in Section 16.6.2.3, “Accessing
the Installed System”.
 Check that the GRUB 2 boot loader is installed on the system. If not, install the
package grub2 and run
grub2-install /dev/sda
 Check whether the following files are correctly configured according to the GRUB 2
configuration principles outlined in Book “Reference”, Chapter 12 “The Boot Loader
GRUB 2” and apply fixes if necessary.
 /etc/default/grub
 /boot/grub2/device.map (optional file, only present if created manually)
 /boot/grub2/grub.cfg (this file is generated, do not edit)
 /etc/sysconfig/bootloader
 Re-install the boot loader using the following command sequence:
grub2-mkconfig -o /boot/grub2/grub.cfg
 Unmount the partitions, log out from the “change root” environment, and reboot the system:
 umount -a
 exit
reboot
16.6.2.5 Fixing Kernel Installation REPORT BUG#
A kernel update may introduce a new bug which can impact the operation of your
system. For example a driver for a piece of hardware in your system may be
faulty, which prevents you from accessing and using it. In this case, revert to the
last working kernel (if available on the system) or install the original kernel from
the installation media.

Tip: How to Keep Last Kernels after Update

To prevent failures to boot after a faulty kernel update, use the kernel
multiversion feature and tell libzypp which kernels you want to keep after the
update.
For example to always keep the last two kernels and the currently running one,
add
multiversion.kernels = latest,latest-1,running
to the /etc/zypp/zypp.conf file. See Book “Reference”, Chapter 6 “Installing Multiple Kernel
Versions” for more information.
A similar case is when you need to re-install or update a broken driver for a
device not supported by openSUSE Leap. For example when a hardware vendor
uses a specific device, such as a hardware RAID controller, which needs a binary
driver to be recognized by the operating system. The vendor typically releases a
Driver Update Disk (DUD) with the fixed or updated version of the required
driver.
In both cases you need to access the installed system in the rescue mode and fix
the kernel related problem, otherwise the system may fail to boot correctly:
4. Boot from the openSUSE Leap installation media.
5. If you are recovering after a faulty kernel update, skip this step. If you need to use a driver
update disk (DUD), press  F6  to load the driver update after the boot menu appears, and choose the
path or URL to the driver update and confirm with Yes.
6. Choose Rescue System from the boot menu and press  Enter . If you chose to use DUD, you
will be asked to specify where the driver update is stored.
7. Enter root at the Rescue: prompt. A password is not required.
Manually mount the target system and “change root” into the new environment. For more information,
see Section 16.6.2.3, “Accessing the Installed System”.
8. If using DUD, install/re-install/update the faulty device driver package. Always make sure
the installed kernel version exactly matches the version of the driver you are installing.
 If fixing faulty kernel update installation, you can install the original kernel from the installation
media with the following procedure.
1. Identify your DVD device with hwinfo --cdrom and mount it with mount
/dev/sr0 /mnt.
2. Navigate to the directory where your kernel files are stored on the DVD, for
example cd /mnt/suse/x86_64/.
3. Install required kernel-*, kernel-*-base, and kernel-*-extra packages of your
flavor with the rpm -i command.
Update configuration files and reinitialize the boot loader if needed. For more information,
see Section 16.6.2.4, “Modifying and Re-installing the Boot Loader”.
9. Remove any bootable media from the system drive and reboot.